


Why would you love me?

by catididnt



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), M/M, Post-Almost Apocalypse (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-04
Updated: 2019-11-04
Packaged: 2021-01-22 14:18:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21303482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catididnt/pseuds/catididnt
Summary: With time to talk after neither Armageddon destroyed Earth nor their respective offices destroyed them, Aziraphale asks the important questions.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 105
Collections: Break in Case of Emergency: Fluff and Love





	Why would you love me?

"Crowley?"

"Mmm?" Slouched on the opposite end of the sofa, Crowley kept scrolling through the forum. The humans remembered enough that they seemed likely to do something about the M25 but he wouldn't risk it losing steam in a few weeks as they dismissed their 'mass hallucinogens' and moved on with life. If he picked out the most vocal now, they'd do the work and he could slip in if they needed encouragement or luck. Burning up Hastur wouldn't replace the Bentley, if it ever came up again, and Hell didn't deserve his motorway-prayer wheel of evil. Bathe him in Holy Water after six thousand years of evil service? Getting the M25 out of sync with the Great Beast would start to balance it; he already had a host of ideas to take Hell, as well as Beelzebub, Hastur and Dagon each, down a notch. And just wait until he'd time to concentrate on Heaven. It'd take more research, but after thousands of years messing with humans, he'd turn them all inside out and they'd never know what hit them. Taking credit would be more fun, but Azraphale was still working through the whole Heaven thing.

Reminded, he glanced over his sunglasses. While Crowley leaned against the armrest, one leg half on the sofa and the other stretched long at an opposite angle, an arm thrown over the back and holding his mobile in his other hand, Aziraphale perched in the opposite corner, back straight, shoulders stiff, book in his lap with his hands resting neatly atop it. His body, face and attention focused straight ahead. No hint he waited for Crowley to pay attention. 

Crowley glanced across the room, at a pile of books that hadn't chanced in the past hundred years, despite the fire last week. "Yes, angel?"

With a start, Aziraphale dropped his gaze to his book, worrying at the corner of a page. He drew in a deep breath twice. "Why would you love me?"

"Wha - I nev - You - When - How -" None of the words passed his throat, just starts of sounds. Shoving himself upright into the corner, he managed a whole sentence in a word. "What?"

"I've been so abhorrent to you. All those things I said, all the times I accused you. I _lied_ to you!" The page tore and he snapped the book closed, still staring at it, as his voice dropped and he whispered his faults. "You always told me the truth. Ever since the beginning." Raising his face quickly, blue eyes wide and pleading, his fingers clenched the book. "Ever since the beginning, I've called you a demon and distrusted you and said you're up to no good!"

"I am a demon. I'm never up to good."

"That's just it! You are! You gave them the apple! Look what they did with it!" He waved the book, a faded blue, probably half a century old that once had a dust jacket and, without the jacket, hadn't a visible title. From the formatting he'd seen earlier, Crowley assumed it was poetry. Then Aziraphale opened both arms, gesturing wildly to take in the entire bookshop and beyond. "You gave them knowledge and they've made marvels with it! They crossed the globe with it, a new way every other time! Medicine and space - they'll reach the stars because of you. And me?" He dropped his arms, the animation leaving his expression. "I gave them War and she's traveled the globe with them. She'll make it to space as well, because of me. I gave them a sword."

"No," he refused, pointing, even as he struggled for a counter point in an argument he couldn't follow. "No, I was just messing with them, getting them in trouble. It's not my fault what they did with it. You-"

"Messing with humans is good for humans. They need a challenge."

"They wouldn't agree," he assured him and, finding his point, plowed on. "You were protecting them when you gave them your sword. Without it, they'd have tried to wrestle the lion instead and that'd have been that for humanity. You were helping; it's not your fault what they did after. That's on them, not on you. And," he leaned back, as if he could be comfortable right now, and waved the rest away, "they'd have figured both out themselves anyway. They're always getting places ahead of us, we were only early the once. Not our fault, neither of them. Anyway, do you want to grab a-"

"And you're doing it again," Aziraphale said, a wiggle of his shoulders as he proved his point.

"I hope it's something bad," Crowley grumbled, and was ignored.

"You're making me feel better. You're talking in circles so I won't feel bad. You've done that since the Garden."

He wrinkled his nose. "I did not. I am not."

"You are. You talked what you did into a bad thing and what I did into a good thing and then dismissed both, and why else would you do that?"

"Because I'm disagreeable." Any other time, he'd revert to the original topic rather than scowl, but he was even less prepared for that one. For explaining it.

"You've always been very agreeable with me," Aziraphale corrected, raising a hand that stopped the reply Crowley hadn't yet figured out anyway. "You bluster, but you've had to answer to Hell and anyone-"

"You gave them the only thing you had," Crowley interrupted, a grin taking over his face as he finally found the hole in Aziraphale's logic. "You couldn't really give them your wings, now could you? Heaven didn't give you anything else, did they? They don't exactly issue halos or harps up there, whatever humans like to think, and I didn't give them anything at all." Lounging back into the sofa again, even propping his other ankle up on his knee and getting dirt on the cushion, he smirked. "I convinced them to steal an apple from God's special tree. I might not've taken into account everything they'd do with it, not any more than you did, but if I gave them anything, I gave them thievery. It's not like either of us could know what they'd do," he added with shrug. "They were brand new, hadn't done anything yet. Don't try to make me into a good guy so you can be a bad guy. Neither of us would enjoy it."

With a huff, Aziraphale pressed his lips together and glared. Crowley checked his watch just for the pretense.

"They'll be opening at-"

"I'm as good at temping them as you are," Aziraphale informed him. "At tempting them to disobey."

"Wha-" He shifted further away, mistrusting this more than the sword and apple bit. "You are not."

"Per the Arrangement, my dear. I succeeded as often as you ever did, and you did as well as I did with blessings and miracles and deliverance."

"Only," he shot back, leaning forward again as he gestured between them, trying to catch the importance of the reason behind it, "because we were pretending to be each other. Neither of us did that on our own."

"Neither of us would've done it at all if our respective Head Offices hadn't ordered it," Aziraphale answered. "We had our own way of doing it ourselves, on our own, but we both did equally well at their orders."

Crowley flopped back again, crossing his arms and hunching his shoulders. "Fine. What's your point?"

"My point," he replied, holding Crowley's eyes this time, regardless the sunglasses, "is that you went out of your way to help and encourage me numerous times when I derided and never trusted you."

"You trusted me."

"I wouldn't give you the holy water when you asked. I thought you'd destroy yourself with it!" His hands fluttered at the memory then he soothed his vest. "You said you didn't want it for that and I didn't believe you. Did you ever intend to use it on yourself?"

"No," he grumbled, scowling then shrugging. "And you gave it to me. That's all that matters. I had it when I needed it."

"I accused you of plotting with the Nazis, and starting the French Revolution, and you know what I smell like!"

Already sitting up and pointing to argue the first two items, the third left him gaping. "What does your smell have to do with anything?"

"Why would you know that if you didn't love me? How can you even like me after everything I've said?"

"I didn't know we were still talking about that, and, anyway, I know what Beelzebub smells like and I don't like them."

"Beelzebub smells like putrid meat rotting on the hottest, most humid day of a hundred year summer," Azirphale said, drawing himself up and shuddering. "I've only met them once and I would know their 'smell' anywhere. And, yes, we're still talking about this. I have done nothing but parrot Heaven's lines about demons and angels since the Garden, despite the evidence from Heaven and you. Everything you said and did! I kept trying to get Heaven to stop Armageddon even when they told me again and again that they wanted it, while not telling you anything when you started by insisting I help you stop it. You kept asking and I lied to you instead of trusting you. And then, because I asked, you drove through the M25 while it was on fire and all the way to Tadfield airbase in a burning car. Your Bentley blew up! We could've shown up earlier, me never discorporated and your Bentley unharmed, if I'd told you right off! But you complimented my dress when you got there."

"It suited you," he mumbled before opening his hands. If it needed saying, and he couldn't avoid it, he might as well just say it. "Probably better we showed up at the very end than the day before; they didn't need us there until the end. You knew what to say to Adam, all that about being human incarnate. I'm good at bringing the worse out in humans, you can bring out the best. You believe in people, you always give them another chance. Even for Heaven. Even for me. You're an easy person to love, angel. Especially for this demon."

"But..." he whispered, his brows drawing together as he pouted. "But I was so mean to you." Despite himself, Crowley grinned at Aziraphale's misery.

"I don't think you know how to be mean. Stubborn and desperate, maybe. Get real territorial about your books and you're more than a bit of a bastard, which isn't something I'll complain about. But not mean, not cruel. Can't be upset about you believing in Heaven when you believed in a demon, can I? 'Sides," he added, guessing at the source, "nothing you said came across in how you acted. Actions speak louder than words and all that. Not like how Heaven kept treating you. They got the words right, I guess, but not the meaning of them. Whatever words you used, you were never mean. Heaven might be a good place if it was anything like you, but you've never been anything like them, angel."

Studying the pattern of the sofa between them, Aziraphale drew in a deep breath and became still but for the flicker of his eyes. Not entirely ignored, Crowley watched him, Aziraphale's lips pressed together as he held his breath while thinking, his desperate concentration as he worked through his concerns, his fingers thoughtlessly drawing small lines on the rough book cover. In Heaven, or those rare times when his fellow angels visited, Aziraphale wouldn't dare lose himself in thought. He could with Crowley; they were safe with each other, and Crowley couldn't explain what being truly safe with anyone else, especially an angel, meant to a demon. What it meant to him personally. He couldn't explain what Aziraphale's relentless welcome and acceptance meant to him either, just that he always knew, whenever he showed up, Aziraphale would be happy to see him.

"Hell found you guilty," Aziraphale said, not raising his eyes. "All those demons. They were going to destroy you in holy water. You'd be gone."

"All those demons would've damned Hastur or Dagon as readily as me," he promised, "just to watch them bubble. We're demons. Don't worry about it."

"You worried."

"Not about holy water," he said with a shrug, squirming at the suggestion. "Hell doesn't really have an abundance of holy water to go around threatening us with. And I used the water from you on Ligur so he and Hastur couldn't collect me. I'm no better."

"Ligur would've hurt you," Aziraphale said sharply, protective on Crowley's behalf and glaring at him for suggesting otherwise. With another huff, he glanced aside. "They dropped... that little demon..."

"Usher?"

"-in just because they didn't believe Micheal!" Wide blue eyes on Crowley, Aziraphale lifted his hands only to drop them. "That could've been you, Crowley! You were right to be worried and I didn't trust you!"

"Look, if you want to apologize I'll forgive you," he offered then paused, glancing aside. "Can I forgive you without you apologizing? That'd be easier. I'm not offended, wasn't back then either. A bit annoyed, but that's not anything. Don't worry about it, I'm not. All's well that ends well. At least my lot gave me the mockery of a trial and witnesses. For you, it was only those three to watch you die."

"Gabriel couldn't be seen consorting with Hell," Aziraphale replied, dismissing the concern with a shake of his head. "He let a demon - a demon he knew to be a demon - upstairs. He probably didn't tell anyone else about it. Probably would've blamed you if anyone, else, found out I died in hell fire," he added, nodding absently. Crowley's heart stopped at how calmly he said it. "He would've said it was your fault, because you got what you wanted in Armageddon and didn't need me anymore. Not that he'd lie, of course. Not directly...." But he shifted as he spoke, all of excuses he provided Heaven in his trailing words. The last words Gabriel meant Aziraphale to hear burned hotter than hell fire in Crowley's ears again.

"I think I need to have a talk with Gabriel," he growled.

"What?" Aziraphale jumped, clutching his hands before him, possibly to stop himself from grabbing Crowley to keep him in place. "No! I'm not having you risk yourself for me when-"

"I dropped a bomb on myself during the Blitz to save your dignity," he countered, raising his brows and smirking. "Risking myself for you is a habit. However, you're not wrong. Blaming me, or you, would be the first thing Gabe'd do, and I won't risk losing you again either. I won't say anything to him, not even indirectly. He won't have any idea what I'm up to."

Opening his mouth to object, Aziraphale closed it more slowly. Six thousand years, a thousand working closely together, he knew Crowley's tricks with humanity and the stress eased from the angel's face. Sitting straighter, he offered, carefully: "If there's anything I help with, you'll left me know?"

"Of course, angel." He waited a beat, unsure if he should ask directly if they'd resolved this or if he should try suggesting dinner again. So far, Aziraphale interrupted before he even mentioned food and Crowley'd prefer a stiff drink.

"What are you going to do?" Aziraphale asked first. "Now?"

"Sit on your couch and drink your whiskey," he replied, grinning at his own cleverness. "Or we could go to dinner."

"Not immediately now," he began, settling easier into his seat as he frowned at Crowley. "Now that Armageddon is over, and we don't have Warlock to watch, and neither of us have a Head Office."

"Sit on your couch," he said, pulling one leg up and resting it on the sofa, his foot almost reaching Azirphale, and then crossing the other over it, "and drink your whiskey."

Someone knocked at the front door and Aziraphale glared at Crowley.

"That's not me!" he assured him, though he drew his feet back to the floor. "If I'd ordered take-out, I would've arranged for it to show up earlier. Back when you suggested I gave humanity knowledge instead of getting them to steal."

Three solid, evenly spaced knocks sounded again.

"We're closed!" Aziraphale called and then frowned. "Really, the sign says closed and the door is locked. They can't see us back here."

"They've not tried to open the door," Crowley pointed out, grateful for the interruption anyway.

They knocked again, the same as before after the same pause as last time.

Aziraphale huffed.

"I'll get rid of them," Crowley said, rolling to his feet. "Scare them off. Meanly. Don't pretend I'm being nice." Opening then closing his mouth, Aziraphale wouldn't object while Crowley did what he wanted and instead huffed again.

The knock repeated.

Pausing his stride as he disappeared from view, Crowley rubbed his jaw and tried to remember when he'd said anything about knowing what Aziraphale smelled like. That'd be the type of specific information he'd pointedly not share with the angel, but it'd been a stressful couple weeks, after a stressful decade, and he could've said anything. And it wasn't like he ever tried to hide his feelings for Aziraphale, or that Aziraphale was ever any good at doing so either. He just never considered he'd ask like that.

Hearing the knock again, he stretched his legs to reach the door before Aziraphale realized he'd paused. The knocker must be counting, they timed every pause and knock precisely.

Around the curtains he saw a beige blazer and, of all things, a beige tartan dress shirt. Not a perfect match, dark beige and orange-gold only almost matching Aziraphale's black and red, but close enough. Starting to smile, amused to scare of such an obvious suitor, Crowley unlocked the door and yanked it open, already scowling.

"We're closed." If not already speaking, he'd not have gotten the words past his throat.

The perfect cut of the blazer and shirt hid her shape, creating the androgynous look her lot were famous for. The caramel dress pants and shiny brown oxford shoes, no spats, almost gave her the appearance of any Londoner. Black hair cropped short, black skin smooth, uninterrupted by the shine of metals, and her eyes the bright green of spring leaves no human could ever match. Those eyes wide, she dropped her hand, raised to knock, and shifted backward.

"You're the demon Crowley," she whispered, her voice catching.

"Yess," he agreed, a snake's smile splitting his face, "I am."

"Holy water doesn't hurt you."

"No," he lied, able to taste her fear, "it doesn't."

"You stopped Armageddon."

"Not alone." By the time he and Aziraphale showed up, Armageddon largely stopped already.

"You saved Earth." Admiration joined her terror as she stood straighter, and he raised his brows. No one talked sense today. "You and Aziraphale stood with the antichrist when he faced down Satan. No one died."

Not after Adam brought everyone back. Never hesitating to take credit for anyone else's work, he still didn't reply.

"You saved humanity. Aziraphale saved humanity." She emphasized Aziraphale's name this time, hope entering her very green eyes as she looked to him. "He refused to fight. All the humans would've died. He refused to fight in the war. He stopped it."

"Right," Crowley agreed, deciding he needed to get Aziraphale's story about his discorporation again, which must've been when this refusing happened. He tapped the collar of her shirt. "Is that what this is about?"

She glanced down then up, uncertain of his question. "That's the platoon's tartan."

"Oh, right. Platoons. I'd forgotten." Angels in platoons with flaming swords. It wasn't Aziraphale who gave humanity a flaming sword. War was a direct gift from Heaven. "What's Gabriel have to do with this? He said he'd leave us alone." Not enough time passed for him to justify breaking his word yet, not after 'Aziraphale' breathed hell fire at him. Crowley'd never had a harder time being not snarky, but hadn't dared breaking character.

Shoulders hunching, she glanced away and began to fidget with nails as green as her eyes. A vine grew through her skin, a line of green with small leaves along the back of her hand, down her wrist and disappearing under the cuff of her blazer. "He doesn't know," she said in a rush, so similar to Aziraphale's confession about giving away his sword Crowley could smell the Garden. "We're forbidden from interacting with Aziraphale or approaching you. But I've friends in Surveillance and we... well..."

"'We'?" he prompted, raising his attention to the street. He couldn't recall if platoons were related, but six thousand years hadn't dimmed family habits. If he waited for her to get to the point, it'd take the rest of the afternoon.

"Just me here," she clarified quickly. "We want to... Well, we want to know. I volunteered to come, in case he's angry."

"Oh, yes, Aziraphale is terrifying when he's angry," Crowley agreed dryly, as if his angel hadn't chosen to become soft.

"And you," she whispered, her eyes wide again.

"Also terrifying," he mumbled, when he'd only tricks and dodges. Other than dropping bombs on churches when they stood inside, he didn't think think they'd really threatened anyone since coming to Earth. Tempted or blessed, regularly; threatened, not so much. "You're from Aziraphale's old platoon and here against Gabriel's orders. Why do you want to know?"

"Well, that is, if it's not too much, about humans. About helping and loving them. About not fighting and caring for Earth."

"Have you ever been to Earth before?" He'd leave Aziraphale to explain the helping and loving of humanity; that'd never been credit Crowley claimed.

She shook her head, her eyes still fixed on his, seeing the snake beneath his shades. The color wouldn't bother her, but the slits would. "No."

"Right, come on." Stepping back, he held the door open for her. "I'm going to end up calling takeout anyway."

"What?" she asked, pausing before she moved.

"It's fine," he lied. If she took after Aziraphale too much, she'd never go back to Heaven once she ate. "Hurry up." Inside, though, she stopped, staring wide eyed at the books. Books on shelves, books on display, books in cubbies, books stacked on the floor. And everything else. Clutter. Nothing like Heaven. And clean, no mold, no broken pipes, no smell, no flies. Nothing like Hell. "It's comfortable. That's a human thing," he added. "Aziraphale's good at it." He'd not be 'good' with a guest right now, though, but he'd be polite and if he didn't sort out their visitor now, she'd come back later. If she tried that, Gabriel or one of the others might notice. Swinging about, he called to the back: "Angel! We've company. It's-"

"Indeed," Aziraphale agreed, standing between shelves. At least the new angel jumped worse than Crowley.

"Seriously? How long have you been there?" Aziraphale paused to give him a look, then smiled kindly at their guest, his checks dimpling.

"Good evening, Tiataen. We weren't expecting you."

"Aziraphale," she breathed his name, her eyes large all over again "Gabriel said..."

"I'm not singed, if you worried," he promised and patted him stomach, "but I choose not to be the fighter I was before. Speaking of," he looked to Crowley, "curry? Mild vegetable korma for Tiataen may be best."

"I didn't know you believed in mild curry," Crowley replied, reaching for his mobile only to find it absent. Miracling it from the floor by the couch, he shook his head at his own carelessness.

"Have you ever eaten before, Tiataen?" Aziraphale asked. Glancing between the two of them, she shook her head. "Best to start simple then. The tea's nearly ready. This way." He half bowed, motioning for her to go first, and let her walk past, she still in awe of the books, while Crowley approached. Before she reached the end of the aisle, she'd paused, reading titles. Though she raised a hand, she didn't touch them.

"How much of that did you hear?"

"My dear, you're not the quietest when vindictive. I heard you agree that 'you are' and came up quietly. Not that I don't think you can't handle trouble yourself." He glanced over his shoulder to Tiataen. "I think she'll be a better reader than you."

"Everyone is a better reader than me. I thought you'd want to hear from her." He tapped Aziraphale's bow tie. "You never told me your tartan almost matched your platoon."

Giving him a look, Aziraphale sighed as he straightened it. "It was a long time ago." Then his eyes narrowed on Crowley. "You're avoiding my question."

"I like asking them, not answering them," he said, uncertain which he avoided at this point. "Do you want me to go? I don't want to interrupt your reunion."

"Any reunion that includes me, includes you." He glanced to Tiataen, but she'd dared to pull a book out, holding it open before her to gently touch the paper as her lips mouthed the words. "What do you want, Crowley?" Azirphale insisted softly. "I do want you to stay. Do you want to stay?"

"I want to be where you are," he replied, that bit obvious since ages ago. No one else cared what he wanted, not as he adapted to the humans ever changing fashions and innovations while appeasing Hell's demands and avoiding Heaven's rules. And even if he didn't know what he wanted in particular, Aziraphale would share what he enjoyed. "If it's not too much, then I want to stay." Or too fast, but he definitely didn't want to relive that memory right now.

"Then we're in agreement." Beaming, he grasped Crowley's hand. "Sit on my couch and drink my whiskey."

"Or wine." He interlaced their fingers and followed down the too narrow aisle toward Tiataen.

"Tea," Aziraphale scolded, startling Tiataen from the book. A human might've dropped it, instead it floated before her and Aziraphale plucked it from the air. "I've others you may enjoy more," he said, sliding it back into place. "And the tea'll be ready. Regardless what others might claim about 'gross matter' sullying the 'celestial body.' I've found Earth improves one. There's so much here that makes us better." He squeezed Crowley's hand as he spoke, and Crowley tightened his hold, just smiling.


End file.
